My, how time flies. We've been busy and just haven't managed to post lately. I'll be starting grad school in the fall, and in May, when our current apartment lease is up, we'll be moving either to St. Louis or Wheaton, IL (outside of Chicago), so we're currently in the middle of donating a lot of stuff and generally down-sizing our lives. But we'll do our best to keep you updated as new information becomes available.
So, on to this post. Over the last approximately years, our general outlook on life has changed considerably. This started largely when Ame was pregnant, with our decision to have a homebirth rather than a hospital birth. From there we've moved to a mostly organic, mostly vegetarian diet (I believe we'd be called 'flexitarians' by those in the know), have been having serious discussions about Addie's future education, and have done our best to move away from the 'typical' American life. I suppose each of these things deserve their own future posts, but that'll do for now.
Anyway, in our apartment we have a rocking horse for Addie. A large, thick, wooden rocking horse. The kind of rocking horse you wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley. And last Sunday, Addie pulled the rocking horse up to the edge of the couch while Ame was ironing some fabric for a fibers piece she's making. Addie was having fun jumping on the couch, dropping on her bottom, then getting up to repeat the act. This is how it played out:
*jump*
"Wee!"
*jump*
"Wee!"
*jump*
THUNK.
Face first on the seat of the rocking horse. The large, thick, wooden rocking horse. Not the rocking horse you think looks absolutely adorable when you place it in your princess's castle of a room, but the rocking horse you proudly set your son upon after fixing him up with a pair of Wranglers, a plaid shirt, red bandana, and functional 6-shooter.
That rocking horse. The edge of the seat caught her right across the cheek, with her nose landing square on it.
Needless to say, Addie was upset. Her cry wasn't of the "I'd rather not do that again, if given the chance" variety, but the "I am in serious pain" variety. Her nose starting swelling immediately, her cheek was puffy, and she had a little bit of blood in her snot.
So, back to the beginning of this post. One of the changes we've made as a family has been a general dislike, maybe even distrust, of the standard American medical system. I'd rather not go into detail about our reasons here, but suffice to say we rarely use Tylenol or similar drugs. We're not going to be letting anybody die for the sake of withholding medication, but don't expect us to be shoveling drugs down our throats for minor ailments.
As a replacement, we have turned largely to homeopathic treatments. Google it if you're interested. The most common homeopathic treatment used in our house currently is something called arnica, which as it turns out is a wonder drug--only it's not a drug, as Ame pointed out to me. Every time we use it, almost invariably on Addie, Ame will state with the utmost incredulity, "Are you
seeing this? Can you
believe this?"
Case in point: after Addie's face's chance meeting with the rocking horse, we gave her a small dose of arnica (in the form of small dissolving tablets). Swelling stopped. The pain, based on the severity of Addie's cries, stopped. Bruising was minimal. And the great thing is, there's no risk of overdose. Really, though, this too should be the focus of its own post, so I'll leave it at that for now. In short, you'd be a subscriber to homeopathic remedies, or at least arnica, had you been here to witness it. Or if you'd rather, just ask Ame; she'll give you her ringing endorsement. "Can you
believe this!?"
